You Bet Your Life

A film about controlling chance. About gambling addiction as the ultimate nightmare. A feverish film that in its design and tempo adopts the form of its theme and the manic urge of its protagonist. The film is skilful and impressively made and the protagonist is played very convincingly by Georg Friedrich. The gambling addict Kurt is so obsessed with gambling that he starts to regard life as a game. A game you can win with the aid of luck and a throw of the dice. He finds himself irrevocably in a downward spiral. Briefly, it looks as if he is able to step out of the world of debt and even more losses. Of six possible jobs, he ‘chooses’ one using the dice. But he has no discipline for work and his new girlfriend Tanja – also ‘selected’ with the dice – is a drug addict. No, things go from bad to worse. In a lugubrious Czech casino, he reaches the inevitable climax. Consistent in its portrayal of the fatal power of chance, the film has a variety of endings. The dice have to offer a way out here too. (GjZ)

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